It’s been a while since I’ve done a summary so with no volunteers to do one for the chat on 08.06.2011 here goes. The full topic was
How to PRESENT new grammar points: different techniques, student engagement, key elements of effective grammar presentation.
Rehearse, repeat, recycle, recognise, reassess, realize and rarely will you go very wrong. @markandrews
Mark’s tweet provided an excellent end point to this eltchat which as usual provided a fast and furious discussion and covered a lot of ground on the topic of presenting grammar. So what did we cover? The following is a selection of tweets from the eltchat which I think best encompass and summarize the hour
Reactions to teaching Grammar
“grammar – love it or hate it? We can’t ignore it!”
“well, we might not be able to ignore it, but we can do a good job of hiding” it .
“Grammar is wonderful and exciting!”
“I do actually LOVE grammar I find the differences in systems between languages really fascinating”
But the big question was “Do we really TEACH grammar?”
Or ‘Do students really learn grammar when we “teach” it in the traditional sense?’ There was a range of opinions voiced about teaching grammar. With one tweeter claiming they were taught, “There’s no such thing as a grammar lesson” to others extolling the virtues of teaching grammar in nuggets.
‘I think we expose our students to it, meet their expectations and hope little damage is done’. But on the other hand ‘many students feel that if they understand the grammar, they have mastered the language, so just want ‘grammar’ lessons’
Other thoughts in this area included:
1. The background to of the learners - Do you think maybe teachers perceptions of grammar stem from how they were taught it at school? I think L1 also influences sts perceptions of how grammar should be learn. . Also depends on level. Some sts appreciate explicit grammar teaching, others don’t. Approaches change at higher levels. Way we present new grammar seems to depend on our own experience learning it, our students’ preferences, ages, and type of class
2. What is the best way to go about teaching grammar - Do you present grammar and then expand? Or, present in context and then extract? How much of grammar the students need is sth that the teacher has to decide
3. Learner Training and Autonomy – Sts need to take control of lang so they ‘own’ it. It’s important to discuss with Sts the function/role of grammar/why we learn it, why we won’t only study grammar in class
4. The perception of accuracy – Students get very uptight about being grammatically ‘accurate’ -they need to be exposed to how native speakers abuse the language! It’s also important not to be too accuracy obssessed: QUITE natural for many teachers when we hear something we think of as WRONG
5. Do we teach prescriptive grammar or descriptive grammar?
So what’s the role of grammar?
- Language is for communication, grammar helps understanding, but not essential. The message more important.
- Grammar is great and without it we cant say anything. It’s linguistic cement & students can learn what they need
- Grammar is HUGE at my school-taught in isolation. I teach in context to writing
- How explicit do you make grammar in class with your students? Do you introduce it with the terminology etc?
- Do we really need grammar?
- Do you teach grammar inductively or deductively grammar
What do u use when u prepare for a grammar lesson, what’s your tool kit?
- Through the medium of cartoon stick men and convoluted timelines
- pull the grammar from the lesson and focus on it as mini-lesson
- Grammar and Vocabulary can often be greatly improved through reading
- I think you should try and extract grammar rather than present it, but it does also depend on students requirements look or the syllabus?
- When I prepare well for grammar, they love it… songs, ppts, competitions, games
- Focus was on Ss noticing language patterns, not “today I’m going to teach the pres perf”
- My favourite is eliciting the form the students that leads them to use the grammar – e.g. last holiday for past
- Use a series of examples, within a dialogue or text
- online sites w/ exercises for practice – sometimes conjugating verbs, sometimes using words in lang
- A good fun story 2 let sts experience grammar in context
- We do digital storytelling. Work on different strategies: descriptive lang, adding dialogues
- Jeopardylabs.com for creating jeopardy grammar games
- personalised grammar great, drilling of structures relevant to ss live
You can find thew whole transcript here
There is a great fallacy believing that it’s our job to explain – and our job is done with explanation (D.Willis)
Remember #eltchat every Wednesday 12 BSt and 21 BST
